washington irving invested christmas in the sense in which we mean it. dickens wanted to make christmas into a symbol of something. obviously what he was saying if we can be kind to each other on this one day of the year why can't we extend it across the whole of the year? as he says and look on those below us as fellow passengers to the grave. but actually christmas caroly mernled not out of any consideration of christmas but out of the parliamentary report on the employment of children in the mines. dickens read it with such disgust and horror he determined, as he said to strike a hedge hammer blow against such activities. the book is the direct result of that. the poor of the book comes when the spirit of christmas present is about to take his leave of scrooge. scrooge did i southeasterns two feral children emerging from the roabz of the spirit. he says spirit are these children yours? and the spirit says they are mankind's. the girl is want. the boy is ignorance. he says those two will destroy civilization. that is the absolute core of that book. dic